Rays have the magic

In the biggest game of the season, Justin Masterson was warming up after 14 pitches. In the biggest game of the season, Boston had two hits in the first six innings.

JON COUTURE

BOSTON — In the biggest game of the season, Justin Masterson was warming up after 14 pitches. In the biggest game of the season, Boston had two hits in the first six innings. In the biggest game of the season, Tampa scored nine runs for the third straight game.

Then, they scored four more. It would have felt like piling on if they didn't advance the narrative.

"Tim Wakefield's 2 2/3 innings," Red Sox spokesman John Blake announced as Masterson trotted in, "is the shortest start by a Boston pitcher in the postseason since Bronson Arroyo went two innings in Game 3 of the 2004 ALCS."

Even if 19-8 isn't 13-4, it's a life preserver. So is 2007, when Boston's tenured member — now 3-7 with an 8.00 ERA in 16 Sox postseason appearances — lost to leave his team in this same 3-1 hole.

"This team has had their back against the wall this year, and even last year in the postseason. I don't think you want to wait until you're down 3-1 to see if you can do it," an injured Mike Lowell said before Tuesday's loss.

Heck, why wouldn't you, Mikey? What better way to fulfill that hope you mentioned later — "I'd love to be in the dugout here for Game 1 of the World Series" — than by the only way this team gets anything done?

"I hope it's relevant," manager Terry Francona said of 2007, but it just as easily could have been 2004, 2003 or 1999. "I mean, I think every year is different. But rather than burden ourselves with what we look at four days from now, we'll set our sights on next game and we'll come packed."

If only all this waxing poetic didn't avoid the critical point. This Rays team is hitting like Boston in those years past. They're playing defense like Boston in those years past. They're passing the hero hat same as these Sox did until the start of the week.

They're dominating in every facet, with Joe Maddon looking the genius and spinning the quotes you'd expect from a man with a reading list and a penchant for Rolling Stones references.

"It's a whole different set of circumstances now, and I don't want to compare it to a past experience," he said of Boston's escapist history. "I just want our guys to be themselves and play our game."

Why shouldn't he? It's got the Red Sox baffled, punchless and looking like a team which got more than it should have from an injury-riddled roster.

"We'll try to take tomorrow, get some guys some hacks if they need it, get the pitchers to get loose, but then we need Daisuke (Matsuzaka) to get us deep and effective," Francona said. "We've had a difficult time. We have not had an answer for a lot of things."

On the day the Red Sox announced they'd acquired Jason Bay, GM Theo Epstein told reporters "I don't think we have to try and catch lightning in a bottle." On the day Francona put J.D. Drew in the leadoff spot for the first time since August, Francona proclaimed "we're looking for a spark."

That's how the playoffs work. Short-term success becoming long-term history. The goal is to get here, then make all the bad memories of the marathon irrelevant. We know it, because they've done it again and again.

They must win two at a raucous Tropicana Field. They must do it with Matsuzaka, a laboring Josh Beckett and a beatable Jon Lester. They must do it with Drew (.154), Ortiz (.071), Jason Varitek (.000) and Jacoby Ellsbury (.000, if he plays again) turning the lineup into a minefield.